Twenty-first Century
Becoming Leslie
More info here.
Posted By: Paul - Tue Feb 11, 2020 -
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Category: Eccentrics, Bohemians, Beatniks, Hippies and Slackers, Regionalism, Documentaries, Twentieth Century, Twenty-first Century
Gaddafi: A Living Myth
With Libya in the news, perhaps it's time to revisit Gaddafi: A Living Myth, the 2006 opera that was billed as an "all singing, all dancing, free-spirited version of the Dictator's life."
Here's a catalog of contemporary reactions.
Speaking before the September premiere of his new commission, Gaddafi: A Living Myth, English National Opera artistic director John Berry averred that it could "redefine opera".
The piece, written by members of Asian Dub Foundation, was billed in advance as a venture of extraordinary audacity, addressing contemporary politics in music that would set our old friend the Classical Music Establishment by its ears.
Some of us had doubts long before the premiere. In December 2005, writing in this paper about the state of affairs at English National Opera, I said: "A commissioned opera from Asian Dub Foundation has had to be put off - and it's not hard to guess why."
When it was finally unveiled, there was not much pleasure to be had from seeing this gloomy prognostication confirmed.
The critics did their worst: "Cliche and bombast ... "repetitive and incoherent ... laughably wooden" ... "as cynical as Simon Cowell" ... "embarrassingly redolent of sixth-form earnestness" ... "long stretches of jaw-dropping banality" ... "risible moments that look and sound like a Middle Eastern version of Springtime For Hitler". Worst of all, almost every review used the word "brave".
Alas, I cannot find a video of the actual production. Here are two of the creators discussing it.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Jan 23, 2020 -
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Category: Bombast, Bloviation and Pretentiousness, Crowds, Groups, Mobs and Other Mass Movements, Dictators, Tyrants and Other Harsh Rulers, Music, Avant Garde, Twentieth Century, Twenty-first Century, Cacophony, Dissonance, White Noise and Other Sonic Assaults
Happy New Year’s Day, 2020!
Posted By: Paul - Wed Jan 01, 2020 -
Comments (3)
Category: Holidays, Twenty-first Century
VARIACIONES 1/113
In the Parque del Retiro (Retiro’s Park) in Madrid, Ines Sastre runs to meet Javier Bardem who is waiting for her with his arms wide open and they embrace one another in a passionate kiss. This only one shot which lasts one minute twenty seconds is subjected to a hundred and thirteen changes for one hour and seventeen minutes. “I wanted to exhaust the possibilities of changing a shot by changing the music, the colours, by burning it, by making some holes…” remembers Aguirre; “sometimes, the heads are not visible, or we can only see her legs, or the image seems to be scrapped off”… /… the variations of this shot are preceded by the ones of another couple taken in the beach of La Concha in San Sebastian that maybe acts as a suggestion of a merely real support for this ideal meeting. The images are accompanied by not only Borges’ voice-over but also Fernando Fernan-Gomez and Francisco Rabal’s voices-over among some not so well-known other voices …/ … disparate prints, sometimes unpredictable, that Borges’ literature proposed to moviemakers of this period and from distant cultures. It is the disparity of Javier Aguirre’s experimentation along with the contradiction that seems us so provocative.
Alas, I cannot find this film online, or even any clips. But I felt WU-vies should know about it, in case any art-house showing appears in your neighborhood, or you find it on disc, or on streaming!
Posted By: Paul - Fri Dec 06, 2019 -
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Category: Annoying Things, Excess, Overkill, Hyperbole and Too Much Is Not Enough, Movies, Avant Garde, Twenty-first Century, Love & Romance
Pingu’s “The Thing”
Posted By: Paul - Fri Jul 12, 2019 -
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Category: Aliens, Animals, Anthropomorphism, Body Modifications, Horror, Surrealism, Stop-motion Animation, Twenty-first Century
Glacier Rub
I guess you can't keep a good (?) idea down. Particularly poignant product name in an era of climate change.
Posted By: Paul - Sat Jun 08, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Body, Head, Business, Advertising, Nature, Patent Medicines, Nostrums and Snake Oil, Twentieth Century, Twenty-first Century
Flying Body Parts Lawsuit
Ruling in what it called a "tragically bizarre" case, an appeals court found that the estate of a man killed by a train while crossing the Edgebrook Metra station tracks can be held liable after a part of his body sent airborne by the collision struck and injured a bystander.
In 2008, Hiroyuki Joho, 18, was hurrying in pouring rain with an umbrella over his head, trying to catch an inbound Metra train due to arrive in about five minutes when he was struck by a southbound Amtrak train traveling more than 70 mph.
A large portion of his body was thrown about 100 feet on to the southbound platform, where it struck Gayane Zokhrabov, then 58, who was waiting to catch the 8:17 a.m. train to work. She was knocked to the ground, her leg and wrist broken and her shoulder injured.
More details at the source.
Posted By: Paul - Mon May 20, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Accidents, Body, Death, Lawsuits, Trains and Other Vehicles on Rails, Twenty-first Century
Follies of the Madmen #425
Would any "respectable" company today use, oh, Dita von Teese as their product spokeswoman?
Oh, wait a minute--they would!
Posted By: Paul - Thu May 16, 2019 -
Comments (3)
Category: Business, Advertising, Domestic, Sex Symbols, 1950s, Twenty-first Century
Mat Fraser’s “Cabinet of Curiosities”
The explanation is here.
Posted By: Paul - Sat Aug 04, 2018 -
Comments (1)
Category: Body, Medicine, Museums, Performance Art, Twenty-first Century
Propellor-Driven Snowmobiles
This notion goes way back.The Russians tried them at the start of the 20th century, with the Aerosani.
Here's one from the 1930s.
And finally, one from 2016.
Posted By: Paul - Sun Jul 08, 2018 -
Comments (1)
Category: Motor Vehicles, Nature, Weather, Twentieth Century, Twenty-first Century
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| Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1. Contact Us |